Why Beginners Should Focus on a Single Activity to Make Money Online

Most people enter the Internet marketing business for money. It’s hard to conceive why anybody would want to ‘waste’ his time in the Internet marketing world if it wasn’t for making some money. It’s not the easiest way to make money but the idea that one could make money from the comforts of home doing the very thing one loves is more than alluring. It’s no wonder why “how to make money online” happens to be one of the most-searched topics on the Internet.

There are people who start a blog purely for the love of writing and without any monetary considerations. A hobby blog, one could say. But these are very few and even though one may start a blog to only write and to get engaged in a healthy pastime, at some point, the blog owner may be tempted to make some money out of his activity. After all, when a blog becomes popular with many subscribers and visitors to it, it’s very easy to monetise it. So, it’s like “why not monetise it and make a good income when everybody else is doing it?”

If you’re reading this, then I’m almost certain that you’re looking at ways to make money online. Or maybe, you’re already into it and a beginner who’s trying to make sense of all the information that’s flying around. It might be that you already have a website and have enrolled in some online business or digital marketing course. Before you enter the online business arena of the Internet, most opportunities to create incomes online might have never crossed your path. Even if they came, you were mostly oblivious to them. However, once you are in the Internet marketing business as an affiliate marketer or as a blogger, you come across a plethora of business opportunities. You have an idea of the Internet which is very different from a layman. For you, the Internet is a goldmine of opportunities. But if you’re a beginner and if you’re not clear about what your online business should be and how you may want to exploit the opportunities provided, you can get easily drowned in the sea of information. Let’s see some of the popular ways for making money from the Internet.

Ways to Make Money Online

There are many legitimate ways of making money online. Depending on how much time and energy you dedicate on these activities, they can be scaled up to make a significant income. Some of these activities are:

#1: Paid Online Surveys

This one’s the easiest and is very popular among college-going students to make some quick buck in their spare time. You just need to fill out a form which can take only a few minutes to complete and can make up to $5 for some surveys. However, most surveys don’t pay you that much. Online surveys are good for those willing to earn some money in their spare time. The earning potential is very limited though.

#2: Online Market Trading

This is basically investing in stock markets and currencies. A very lucrative option with a virtually limitless potential to make it big, there are many online market trading platforms available. There are good training platforms that teach you the basics of online trading. However, trading involves risk and only a few people are successful.

#3: Online Betting

There are many online betting sites that allow you to earn good money. The activity is legal and anybody can do it. But then, it is not without risks. Risky not because of the authenticity of the betting sites as such but the activity being such, there’s no guarantee for success.

#4: Start a Website

With a website, there’s an endless array of monetising activities you can perform. If earning passive income is what you’re looking for, then you need a website. Whether it is for blogging or for affiliate marketing, a website is what you need. With it, you will be able to earn money while you sleep. It’s very simple to start a website. Driving traffic (your potential customers) is never easy and despite its relative ease for making a start, the failure rate is very high. But when it clicks and when there’s a good volume of traffic, it is one of the best methods for earning income.

#5: Review Website and Apps for Money

A very simple way to earn legitimate money online, there are platforms that pay you up to $10 for reviewing websites and new apps. If you have an eye for detail, it can be a fun way to earn some quick money. It could take you up to 20-30 minutes for a full review of a website which is cool. Can this be a full-time activity to replace your conventional office job? Maybe not.

#6: Publish a Kindle eBook

If you love writing and researching, you can easily publish an eBook and sell it. You can sell your eBook at Amazon Kindle store and make money. The global market for Kindle books is huge and with a popular store like Amazon, it is a real deal. You can list your eBook there and earn a good commission (up to 70%) from its sale. If you can provide good information in a well-researched book on common problems faced by the people and package it up with good illustrations and exquisite cover designs, it is a highly lucrative option. It’s another way to earn passive income. It’s a very competitive market though and for you to succeed, you have to have an edge over other books on similar topics.

#7: Affiliate Marketing

Do you already have a blog? Do you have a good social media presence? If you have, then you can start generating a good income by promoting all sorts of products and services. There are many affiliate networks where you simply sign up and start promoting the products there. When people buy or sign up for services through your promotional efforts, you get paid a commission. You can do affiliate marketing from a blog or even from a Facebook page by posting the affiliate products there. The earning potential is huge.

#8: Network Marketing or Multi-Level Marketing (MLM)

The Network Marketing or Multi-level Marketing (MLM) is one of the most lucrative ways to creating a good income. In this business model, you can generate continuous income by selling products and by recruiting other members who are then encouraged to sell the products (or recruit members). The model allows you to earn money from the sales made by those you recruited under you (your downline). Definitely not a get-rich-quick option, but nonetheless if the products you sell are good and well-loved by the people, you can make a killing from this business.

#9: Gigs on Fiverr

This is the world’s largest marketplace for making money by selling small services. Be it writing, social media posting, designing, teaching, music lessons, videos, voice-overs, translating, there’s money to be made. There are always people on the lookout for services and if you can deliver good services, you can build up an online authority there within the platform. Like the Joker says, if you’re good at something, never do it for free! At Fiverr, you have the ability to make a decent income from your gigs.

#10: Sell Your Own Courses

At places like Udemy, you can become a tutor to many students. With these online tutoring sites, you can sell your expertise to a global audience. If you can create an online course on any topic (on ANYTHING) and sell it at Udemy, you can earn as long as there are people who are ready to buy.

#11: Sell Photos

You can make money from your creativity in photography. If you can upload your photographs on certain websites dealing in stock photography in categories that have a high demand, they can fetch a good price. There are always buyers in the market looking for unique photographs to be used exclusively in their business campaigns, literature, websites, etc.

#12: YouTube Videos

People look up to YouTube for anything. Be it music videos, news, instructions, recipes, exercise, reviews, people turn to YouTube for anything. When you upload videos, you can earn a percentage of the advertising revenue. Your success will depend on the popularity of your video and the subscriber base.

#13: Bitcoin and Cryptocurrencies

Touted as the currency of the Internet, the Bitcoin and Cryptocurrencies come with a lot of hype. There are also some ambiguous information and scams happening too. But there’s no doubt about the excitement happening in this arena. There are claims of people making millions of out of cryptocurrency trading but you need to exercise caution to be able to understand the whole hoopla surrounding it.

I have listed only the more popular ones among the different ways to make money online. There are lots more than the ones listed above,

Are You Looking for Earning Passive Income?

If it is earning “passive income” (the earn-while-you-are-sleeping kind) you’re looking at, then you would create a website and try to monetise it. It could be done in many ways – ads, the sale of affiliate products, the sale of your own products or providing business leads.

You create a nice website, write amazing content, do SEO, promote your blog and let the traffic flow in. It could take you a few months or even more than a year to see some result (the traffic) but once everything clicks, it’s an amazing way to create income online.

But you have seen that earning through a website or blogging is just one of the ways of making money online.

When you enter the Internet marketing world as a newbie, you are mostly clueless about making money online. At best, your knowledge is limited to making money through “Get Paid To” sites by doing random activities – clicks, watching videos, surveys, etc. However, in time, you are exposed to many other business opportunities.

As seen in the examples listed, there are a few avenues where you can earn passive income like making money on autopilot. Blogging, affiliate marketing, YouTube videos, selling courses online, publishing eBooks, well, you have lots.

Don’t Get Overwhelmed – Decide on an Activity

As a beginner, when you are bombarded with all these information on how to make money online, you can get easily overwhelmed and confused.

Let’s say, you start your online adventure with a newly-created website. You feel that’s what fits you most. Perhaps you have enrolled yourself for an affiliate marketing or digital marketing course. There’s so much to learn if you’re a complete newbie right from how to set up a WordPress site, get it hosted on a server, to the SEO where you learn the ways to drive traffic to your site. There’s an enormous amount of skills you will be learning.

Now that you have decided to be an Internet marketer and monetise your website, you should be mentally prepared for many things –

It’s difficult to choose a niche that’s both a passion for you and profitable as well.

It’s difficult to write good quality posts consistently.

It’s not easy to get ranked on popular keywords if you have a new website.

It’s not easy to make people take notice of your content.

It takes a long time for people to trust in your brand.

There’re already too many established blogs in the same niche as you are.

People’s choices and tastes keep on changing.

When the traffic does not pick up as expected and when there are no sales or referrals happening, you kind of get disheartened and begin questioning if this was worth it. You have been spending an insane amount of time in front of the computer and yet nothing is happening even after having written many posts and doing all those SEO things.

You’re now at your most vulnerable self to big-time distractions. By now, you have realised that making money through a website (affiliate marketing) is damn hard. It’s just too competitive.

Ask yourself this question – is it affiliate marketing that you’re looking at? Or is it MLM? It will never be easy but you need to be very clear with what you want to do.

I do not mean to discourage you but you will have to confront with this hard question someday. After all, we only have twenty-four hours in a day. We all want to utilise our time optimally, don’t we?

One of the most common tips for generating good revenue is to create multiple income streams.

But this tip is certainly not for beginners.

There’s so much to learn. If you’re a beginner, it’s important that you stick to just one activity and to try to get your business off the ground first. It’s not advisable to branch out from early on.

Focus on ONE activity only.

If it is affiliate marketing and making money from affiliate sales and referrals, so be it.

If you want to generate revenue through online trading, well that’s great.

If it is MLM (MLMs can be through a website too in many cases), you should go ahead. It’s still one of the most lucrative and fulfilling ways to create income.

The point is – if you’re a beginner, let it be a single activity. Let your business take off first.

8 comments
On Why Beginners Should Focus on a Single Activity to Make Money Online

Actually I’m looking on various ways to make money online and came across at your site. I have already tried paid surveys, but they never functioned for me. Most of the times, my country of residence was not eligible for taking part of the survey. I’m not for online betting either or market trading (it requires a certain level of experience, otherwise you can loose a lot of money). I’m very interested on affiliate marketing and recently have started an online training to learn the basics. Hope I will have some success.

Thanks for visiting my site, Leo. Much appreciated. If have decided to be an affiliate marketer, it’s best to channelise all your energy into it. There’s no point letting yourself get distracted by other money-making schemes even though they may legit or show quick results. Wishing you the best for your business!

Hi and thank you for this very helpful, useful and informative article.

You are so right it is much better to learn your trade so to speak. Learn it and grow with it.

It is far better to be really good at one thing than to be fairly good at many. I see it like this, it is like trying to clean your house and running around trying to clean all the rooms at the same time. It is possible to get it done but it will take much longer getting it done and there is a real possibility that you will get tired and stop and leave it for another time and then start the process all over again. Running around in a circle. lol

I have learned a lot from this article you have given me food for thought, thank you.

Thanks for reading my post, Jennifer. Really, as beginners it’s necessary to learn all the tricks of the trade and focus on a single activity. We should not get too thinned out trying to pursue many money-making ventures at the same time. On the other hand if focus on a single activity, you are more likely to have a better grip on the things and be more productive. One does not like running around in circles, like you say 🙂

Hi Sukumar, when I was a beginner I focused on multiple activities to make money online, oww, was I wrong! It has cost my an awful lot of energy and time, and it didn’t bring me much money either. I did surveys, lot of mind-numbing questions and low payments. I still have some gigs on Fiver, got a couple of responses on them, but it never came further than that. One thing is sure, whether you work offline for a boss, or online and be your own boss. You have to work for it, it doesn’t come with the wind. You have some great suggestions to focus on. MLM and betting are not my thing, writing on a website suits me better. I like the idea to earn money while I am asleep. Maybe Udemy is something too to focus on, for now I am offering all my training for free on my website.

Thanks for visiting my site, Loes. I guess, what you have described about yourself when you were a beginner happens to most people. I too wasted much time and energy chasing other activities besides my website in trying to make some money. I could neither focus on my website-building (which was not very easy anyway since I was a newbie) nor on the other money-making gigs. I did not make any money. After wasting my money and time, I regain my focus and like you, concentrated on my website. Things got better. I learnt my lesson. One should not branch out too early. It’s better to focus on a single activity. Maybe when one earns much income and when the business goes more on the autopilot mode (no business can seriously go on autopilot though), one could try in other activities. Till then, it should be one activity only.

Hello, I read and really like your article. What I loved most about it was your honesty. You did an excellent job of telling the truth about what people could expect as beginners trying to make money online. And you covered a lot of available options. The article is well written and it’s long so that it will satisfy google. This is your point: Why Beginners Should Focus on a Single Activity to Make Money Online. This is your answer – Making money online is difficult if you’re a beginner, choose a single activity. Let your business take off first. Your article had a lot of good information, your ads are well placed it looks great! It does tell me how difficult it is to make money online.

As a beginner, when you are bombarded with all these (all this) information on how to make money online, you can get easily overwhelmed and confused.

This is an informative and well-written article. Your ads are well-placed and interesting – so all in all you’ve done a very good job.

Thanks for reading my post, Kundi. Appreciate your inputs too. Most beginners try to rush into things and end up getting frustrated and confused instead of making any money. One should focus on a single activity to have better focus in the beginning. I know this because I have been there. I used to have my fingers in too many pies in the beginning.

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About Me

Hey, I’m Sukumar Thingom. For years, I struggled as a blogger and made many mistakes. The purpose of my blog is to help newbie bloggers manoeuvre their way through the extremely confusing world of internet marketing without having to waste much precious time.